In order to provide surveillance and/or situational awareness associated with a stationary or moving object (e.g., in a ground, nautical, or aerial surveillance situation), an imaging system that captures a 360° panoramic view of an area surrounding the object may be desired. An image sensing device (e.g. a CCD image sensor, a CMOS image sensor, a FPA image sensor, etc.) typically has a field of view less than 360°. One way of capturing a 360° panoramic view of a surrounding area is to utilize multiple image sensing devices, positioned so that each image sensing device has a field of view that captures a portion of the 360° panoramic view and that the collective fields of view captured by the image sensing devices encompasses the entire 360° view. Such a system may be costly and complicated.
Another way of capturing a 360° panoramic view of a surrounding area is to utilize a single image sensing device that is rotated about an axis so that the image sensing device captures the entire 360° field of view as it rotates. As the image sensing device rotates, the image it gathers may be blurred because the pixels of the image sensing device may not be exposed to a particular field of view for long enough to generate a stable image.
Accordingly, a need exists for alternative panoramic imaging systems that mitigate image blurring as an image sensing device is rotated about an axis to capture a 360° panoramic view.